Being your son was the greatest honor of my life, Pa

Now he let the soil slide between his fingers and fall on the mound. The fresh bouquet of flowers lies indifferently next to the wooden cross. The words were rolling, again and again in his mind.
“Being your son was the greatest honor of my life, Pa”
He began to laugh; slowly, louder, boisterously and then turned into a crescendo. I had never seen him so hysterical before, consumed by mirth. Everyone else was preoccupied with the woman in black shades. The way they would pass by her, murmur their pleasantries then move out. Yet the old man was there, making merry at that heap of soil. He spat masticated snuff that he had been chewing at on the heap of soil, hit it three times with his walking staff, and then burst out with laughter. I looked at his eyes; tears hung beneath hiss puffy eyelids but seemed to be held back by a force stronger than gravity.

“Boy, you knew him right?”
“Yes sir, we faced the knife on the same day”
“You are convinced it was suicide?”
“I don’t know sir; he said so in the letter”
“Do you think he is in there? I mean, couldn’t he have gone to visit his boyfriend or ran off to somewhere it is tolerated, the act?”
I was silent. He was silent too. The scorching afternoon sun made sweat drip down his brow. He rubbed off the annoying liquid with his weathered palms. I had not seen it coming and when it did, it hit him so hard that his frail bones shook in their frame-the mirth. He walked towards the woman, laughing.
“You think he is in there? You make me laugh. You and all this people, your gaucherie. He has flown off, far away. He has gone, gone with his boyfriend to America.”
He sat down on a kinky patch of grass and wore a Mona Lisa half smile. People murmured under their breath. The old man’s head was no longer correct.